Keeper, letter horde, soul grinder

[olderplayer]

Suggestions? Comments?

Here is the list:

Fiends of Slaanesh (2#, 110 pts)

Herald of Tzeentch (1#, 240 pts)
(Battle Standard Bearer), Great Standard of Sundering
1 Master of Sorcery
1 Spell Breaker
1 The Lore of Life

Chaos Furies (5#, 60 pts)

Chaos Furies (5#, 60 pts)

Bloodletters of Khorne (40#, 535 pts)
Full command
1 Icon of Endless War

Herald of Khorne (1#, 140 pts)
1 Armour of Khorne
1 Firestorm Blade

Pink Horrors of Tzeentch (10#, 120 pts)

Keeper of Secrets (1#, 585 pts)
Level 2 Wizard; 1 Spirit Swallower

Fiends of Slaanesh (1#, 55 pts)

Flesh Hounds of Khorne (5#, 175 pts)

Screamers (3#, 120 pts)

Soulgrinder, 300 pt-fire thrower option

Composition Report:
Points of Lords: 585 (0 - 625)
Points of Heroes: 380 (0 - 625)
Points of Core: 655 (625 - Unlimited)
Points of Special: 295 (0 - 1250)
Points of Rare: 465 (0 - 625)

In June and early August ran a similar build in two 5 round tournies but without soulgrinder or screamers. Kept getting paired up against war machine heavy armies (ogres, OnG, dwarves, empire), so went 3-1-1 and 2-2-1 against ranked opposition. Instead, a unit of 6 flamers, 3 instead of 2 fiends in larger fiend unit, extra unit of 5 furies, extra fleshhound, extra bloodletters, music on horrors unit. Not sure the Keeper is optimal, even with spirit swallower, he is prome to getting killed by war machines (first turn even when screened by fiends or when over-run or pursuit or combat reform leaves him out of combat) and to SCR when hit in flanks and rear and if opponent has unit with S5 or S6 or poisoned attacks. But he is fun to play.

Have playtested this version recently (tabled opponents in 3 games but only one opponent had war machines and they missed enough that screamers and furies and fiends killed them before they did serious damage to grinder or Keeper). Not sure soul grinder is worth cost if run into lots of war machines and stuff. Thought of maybe running second herld of tzeentch (winged horror and BSB and with scroll on one Hotz; then other HoTz has MoS and flames of tz or power vortex). That way BSB can escape and move around to cast low cost Tzeentch spells (single dice flickering fire at end) while other Hotz is primary caster and can take a miscast.

I am finding Keeper is hit or miss at lvl 2. Incredible with succor, phant. and caress (great against knights and high AS, lower T units) spells. But the stupidity spell is meh unless I hit a low LD monster or chaff unit out of range of general.

Sundering banner is needed to deal with number of lvl 4's common in most armies faced.

[und_ed]

Kipper is always going to be a liability against a shooting-heavy environment. I can understand why you're using Life as a patch against him copping wounds going in, but I still think it's a very poor choice of magic Lore when you cannot generate much in the way of power dice. (Life really shines with things like Slann or HE, who can reliably generate extra power dice to make the most of the throne of vines, and also with a level 4 can stretch their power dice a lot further than we can with a level 2)

If you know your environment is war-machine-heavy, I strongly recommend a Herald-led army, leaving the greater daemons at home. Even a GUO doesn't enjoy being targeted by 3+ war-machines, and even if it survives it's now sitting with 2-3 wounds left by the time it hits combat, which is not a great prospect.

-und_ed

[olderplayer]

Thanks. I really thought about dropping the Keeper but I wanted something challenging and fun to play. The combo of life magic, terrain on the battlefield (the upcoming tourney will have obstacles, buildings, and impassible terrain and hills blocking LOS), and a screen of fiends usually but not always keeps the Keeper alive long enough for him to get into combat or close enough to something to keep the cannon from being able to shoot him.

Life magic is really important with a single herald. With the single herald BSB, I need to minimize miscasts (throne of vines when I get a lot of dice is great) and life has lower casting costs than the other lores I would consider (with the exception of heavans). I find flesh to stone on bloodletters (with or without throne being up) often makes the letters rock. I often end up runnning the horrors right behind the letters and, if the HoK is wounded, then he often gets a would back with life.

[mad lamb]

I've played 6 tournaments with life BsB HoT and spirit swallower Keeper. Aganist dwarves only real threat are stonethrowers. Cannons aren't that big of an issue cause fiends will block the cannonball.

And Life is only "safe" lore for BSB HOT if you don't want to risk blowing up your BSB with miscast.

Your army looks very simmilar to ones I played (soulgrnder wasn't there yet). Only thing I miss is 2nd big block. With only one solid block I think you/ll suffer against massive infantry armies. I'd change those fleshhounds for another unit of letters builded up with some more points that you can scratch somewhere?

[Asamu]

It's a solid list. I saw an almost identical list vs an Ogre army yesterday, and it performed incredibly well. It lost, but that was because of very minor mistakes in movement and targeting during combat; even with those mistakes, it should have won.

I would recommend the stubborn banner with this kind of list over the sundering banner because you are running multiple monsters with no static res or ranks. Making them stubborn will help to keep them from exploding at any point in time from a failed leadership test after wiffing a combat round.

The Soulgrinder performs incredibly well vs armies where low initiative is common due to the ability to auto hit, or where templates can rack up a lot of points very quickly such as: Lizards, Ogres, Brets, High Elves, Daemons, Tomb Kings and Vampires. It also performs well against Warriors because of the toughness 7: most of any warrior army will be strength 5, so being toughness seven makes a soulgrinder incredibly hard for Warrior armies to kill. Against Empire, Dwarfs, Skaven and Ogres, you will need to be careful against the cannons. It moves fast, so you can get it into combat pretty quickly. Against standard cannons, it is great as a shield to keep the Keeper of secrets alive until it can get into combat; against Skaven cannons, the high toughness will make it harder to kill, but it can't be used as a shield due to the fact that warplightning 'cannonballs' do not stop when they fail to kill a target.

[olderplayer]

Thanks. I am finding that the soul grinder can be very effective in dealinhg with certain types of armies and units.

I agree with the comment regarding a second letter unit or a PB unit. However, what I am finding is that would mean giving up either the horrors as a unit babysitting the HoTz and the fleshhounds or something else. There are certain targets the fleshhounds can deal with and their speed is quite handy. I also feel that the herald is what makes the letters go and reducing the size of the letters unit and dropping some other units to fit in a second larger unit would still not allow for that second herald and would limit the ability of the first unit to retain its horde configuration. That would tend to suggest using PB's with the re-roll to wound banner and greater T over a second unit of letters.